


Unforgettable

by Ghostinthehouse



Series: Sheathed Claws [3]
Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis, Dark Is Rising Sequence - Susan Cooper
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-03-09
Packaged: 2019-11-14 05:05:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18046046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghostinthehouse/pseuds/Ghostinthehouse
Summary: Not such a chance meeting, after all.





	Unforgettable

She notices the white-haired boy first. He holds himself the way Peter always did, with an unconscious majesty that draws eyes to him. He looks nothing like Peter, and draws followers with his kingliness all the same. This boy, she is sure, knows what it is to be a king. Or knew once. His body hasn't forgotten the way of moving in a language of leadership, even if it takes another once-monarch to recognise it.

She shapes her lectures to his needs, drawing even more than usual on the problems she solved as queen. She recasts them as hypothetical, changes the names and details to better fit this world and walks her students through them.

There's another boy, not one of her students, waiting and watching in the doorway. It takes her a moment to see Edmund in him. There's a faint, grieving, worldweariness about him, very withdrawn, as if he wanted to see without being seen. As if he had seen more of the darkness beneath the sweetened smile of everyday than those around him. His gaze, she notices, is on the young king. Merriman had said there would be a watcher left, the last time they had shared tea, and asked her to watch for him. She had nodded. No-one should be left alone after it all ends.

Now she steps up behind the second boy and coughs discreetly. He murmurs an apology and gets out of her way. "Once a king or queen, always a king or queen," she tells him quietly, wrapping her own queenliness around her for a breath.

For just a moment his eyes flicker much older than his years. Almost as old and dark as Merriman's eyes flickered on occasion, and she bore it as she had once borne another Lion's gaze. Then it vanishes, and all that's left is a young man aching for reassurance. She doesn't ask how he knows the young king, or what his world is. That's none of her business.

There's only his pleading, "Even if they forget?"

"Even if they forget." She clips the end off. Some things are unforgettable: the weight of a crown, the stance of a king, the instincts of leadership. Some things are unforgiveable: losing everyone you care about at once. "Good day." She vanishes into her study and closes the door behind her before the old grief can unsheathe its claws and sink them too far into her heart.


End file.
